


Our future lies bleeding

by stjarna



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Post Season 4, S5 spec, angst with hopeful end, space, spec fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-03 19:18:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10973682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stjarna/pseuds/stjarna
Summary: Since waking up on a space station three months ago, Fitz has tried to keep his distance. But Jemma might just have enough of it.





	Our future lies bleeding

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to @dilkirani for the beta

He stands in front of the large window in the common area, his hands tucked in his pockets. The dark vastness of space spreads out in front of him, asteroids floating far closer than Jemma feels comfortable with.

She hesitates for a moment before walking up to him and stopping by his side; not too close, in case he feels uncomfortable, but close enough to allow herself to imagine that she could reach over and interlace her fingers with his if he let her.

His eyes dart briefly in her direction before returning to the universe in front of him. She’d gotten used to his shy, guilty glances over the past three months that they’d been on this space station, but they still pricked at her heart like fine little needles.

He hadn’t been able to avoid her entirely—the station is too small for any real privacy—but he sure had tried, spending more time in his bunk than anyone else on board. But Jemma was nothing if not determined, ready to jump at any opportunity to let him know that she was there, that she was alive, that she wasn’t trying to push him away or keep him at bay. Unfortunately, he appeared to be just as stubborn in his self-flagellation efforts.

“How’s your day been?” she asks, hearing her heart beat in the now familiar, nervous fashion whenever she tried to start a conversation, no matter how trivial. “Haven’t seen you at all.”

He shrugs. “New—” He pauses, forming air quotes. “‘recruit’ arrived today. Technician. Her Highness told me to show him around.”

“Is she aware you call her Highness?”

“As if I care,” he mumbles quietly.

Jemma sighs, forcing a smile. “How’d it go?”

He scoffs. “Took him forty-six seconds to make a ‘Beam me up, Scotty!’ joke. New record.”

A quiet chuckle escapes Jemma’s lips, as she looks at him. “So, how’d you punish him?”

His head slowly turns in her direction, his eyes squinting, questioningly. “What?”

Jemma can’t quite remember the last time he’d looked at her for this long. It feels like a small victory.

“Are you trying to tell me it was pure coincidence that the last person to make that joke ended up unclogging a spilled-over toilet an hour later?”

His gaze falls to the floor, but the corners of his mouth twitch briefly into the hint of a boyish grin. “Dunno what you’re talking about,” he mutters under his breath, tapping the floor with the tip of his shoe.

The quasi-confession is enough to make Jemma laugh out loud.

He looks back up and there’s something in the way he stares at her that momentarily takes Jemma’s breath away.

“What?” she asks, feeling herself blush as she tucks her hair behind her ears.

“Nothing.” He shakes his head, dropping his gaze back to the floor and the hopeful spark that had flickered up briefly in Jemma’s chest extinguishes just as quickly as it had ignited. She sighs, letting her eyes wander to the universe instead.

“How’s _your_ day been?” His question conjures the hint of a sad smile to her lips. At least he’s trying to do small talk. It was better than silence, you’d think.

Jemma exhales sharply. “I’ve been stuck in a windowless lab all day, doing mundane experiments on extraterrestrial plants and tissues.” She scoffs. “Day? What even _is_ a day here? It seems so pointless to even try and keep track of time, doesn’t it?”

He shrugs. “Three months. Eighteen days. Sixteen hours and—” He pauses, looking at his watch. “Twenty three minutes.”

Jemma chuckles involuntarily.

“You would have chosen chocolate-banana-cream, wouldn’t you have?” Jemma’s not sure where that question comes from, but she’s relieved when she sees his lips pull into a one-sided smile.

He nods ever so slightly, sighing deeply. “Yeah.”

For a few minutes, the room falls silent as if space has pulled them into its noiseless vacuum.

“I’ve missed your laugh.”

Jemma’s head shoots in his direction in surprise, for a moment unsure if maybe she just heard him in her head. “What?”

The blue eyes looking back at her are shy and nervous, his hands still tucked into his pockets. “I’ve missed your laugh. That’s… that’s why I stared at you earlier. It was nice to hear it again.”

Jemma blinks, feeling her eyes fill with tears, her chin quivering, the corners of her mouth twitching into a smile afraid to be hopeful. She swallows, trying to find her bearings.

“I’ve missed yours too, Fitz.” Her smile and her voice become a bit more confident. “I’ve missed your laugh and your smile, and your voice, and your touch, and _you_. I miss you. It seems so ridiculous that we’re stuck on this little tin can in space together and yet I feel like we’re more separated than when the entire galaxy was between us!”

She notices the single tear before he manages to wipe it from his cheek, sniffling quietly.

“Are you keeping your distance because you think that’s what I want or because you’re trying to punish yourself, Fitz?”

He doesn’t reply.

“Cause if it’s the former then let me tell you that it’s _not_. It’s _not_ what I want! And if it’s the latter then. Then _stop_. Please. Because… because you don’t deserve punishment and because I’m selfish and I’m gonna tell you that _I_ don’t deserve that either. _We_ don’t deserve punishment, Fitz. Least of all from ourselves! We’ve suffered enough.”

He gestures at himself with both hands. “It’s my fault, though, Jemma! AIDA. The Framework. Us being sent to exile here. It _is_ my fault.”

She rolls her eyes, having grown tired of his argument; the same one he’d used over and over the few times he’d been willing to talk about it at all. “Fitz. Daisy told you, you’re not to blame. You have _nothing_ to apologize for. We’ve _all_ told you. Not for what you helped create and not for what you did in the Framework. Even _Radcliffe_ told you that it wasn’t your fault. That it was his! AIDA. Being corrupted by the Darkhold. The Framework getting out of hand. You are _not_ to blame. When will you believe us?”

He shrugs, his voice growing louder while his index finger digs into his own chest. “I helped him, Jemma. With AIDA. With the Framework. And I hid AIDA from you. And—”

“Oh, for crying out loud,” Jemma screams and he stops, staring at her wide-eyed. Jemma takes a step toward him, throwing one hand in the air. “Yes! Yes, Fitz. _Fine_. _You_ helped Radcliffe built AIDA. _You_ helped him build the Framework. _You_ hid AIDA from me. _Fine_. It’s _your_ fault. But guess what? _You_ had to hide AIDA from me because _I_ was Mace’s second hand and I would have had to tell him about it and you couldn’t risk that. So _there_. It’s _my_ fault for taking that position. And I took the position because _Coulson_ stepped down as Director and I wanted to have some kind of control over what happened to our team. So there. It’s _Coulson’s_ fault. And Coulson stepped down in part because he wanted more time to find Daisy. So it’s _Daisy’s_ fault. And Daisy ran away after _Lincoln_ sacrificed himself. So it’s _Lincoln’s_ fault. And Lincoln sacrificed himself to stop _Hive_. So it’s _Hive’s_ fault. And do you _see_ , Fitz? Do you _see_ how there’s _always_ someone to blame? How there’s _always_ someone who might feel guilty? I can go on and on and on until the beginning of time, until the first microorganism accidentally bumped into another. But you know what, Fitz? _It doesn’t matter!_ It doesn’t matter in the end who’s to blame and who might be guilty because _it cannot be changed_. The past is _done_. It has _happened_. And it might _hurt_ , but feeling _guilty_ , and _blaming_ yourself, and keeping your distance _won’t help_! I know! I know, Fitz, because I tried that! I tried it after Maveth and I tried it when you were recovering after Ward dropped us in the ocean and I thought I was making you worse and you’d get better if I left, ‘cause I felt like it was all my fault. I tried that and _it didn’t work_. And it didn’t work for _Daisy_. _It doesn’t work, Fitz_! It _doesn’t_ make things better. There’s _no use_ in keeping one foot in the past and letting it drag you back. There’s _no use_ in punishing yourself. It _doesn’t_ help! It _won’t_ change the past. _Nothing_ will. But we—”

“I look at you and I see a barrel pressed against your head and my hand on the trigger, Jemma! How do I not deserve punishment for that?” His blue eyes are closer to her face than they’ve been in months, fiery, angry, confused.

Jemma gestures at herself. “I see myself pulling a trigger and your father collapsing on top of me, Fitz! I remember killing a man you _loved_ in that reality, because it _was_ a reality! It was _real_ to you, and you had _every_ right to want revenge for that, because just as much as _you_ weren’t yourself in there, _I_ wasn’t myself either. We were _both_ different people. _Strangers_ to each other. Daisy is right! We _lost_ ourselves in there. _All_ of us.”

She takes a few deep breaths, trying to calm down her voice. “When you remember me in there, when you see the barrel pressed against my head, Fitz, do you remember your father’s killer or do you remember the woman you love?”

He has tears in his eyes, his chest heaving anxiously up and down. “The woman I love. _You_. I see _you_!”

Jemma scoffs, her lips pulling into a pained smile. She shakes her head. “No. No, Fitz. In _that_ moment, in _that_ memory, in that reality, I _wasn’t_ the woman you loved! _Ophelia_ was. That was your reality then! And I know in retrospect you hate yourself for pressing a gun against my head, but _in there_ , Fitz? In there you saw the person who’d killed your father while you had to listen helplessly over the phone. I looked at you in there and I saw the pain I caused you and I knew I deserved it. I _deserved_ the gun against my head and you pulling the trigger because I had hurt you in a way I _never_ wanted to hurt you!”

She presses her lips into a thin line, trying to keep from crying. “But that was _there_ and now we’re _here_ , Fitz. And here you’re _not_ holding a gun against my head. And here I _didn’t_ kill your father. So look at me, Fitz, and _see_ me! See me for who I am! The woman you love! And see yourself for who _you_ are! The man who loves me! The man who would _never_ hurt me! When I look at you, I _don’t_ see that man with a gun, Fitz, I see the man I _love_ , the man I want a _future_ with, the man I want to _marry_ and grow _old_ with. The man I want to be the father of my _children_! _That’s_ who I see and that’s who I will _always_ see.”

“Jemma—”

“No. No,” she interjects, shaking her head vehemently, noticing once again how her volume increases. “I’ve had _enough_ , Fitz. I… I watched you when you were in the isolation cell with AIDA. I heard you. And—”

“You did?”

She barely hears his question, words spilling out beyond her control. “—let me tell you that my love for you will never fade _either_! And our future _isn’t_ dead! And you didn’t kill it, Fitz! Maybe it’s _bleeding_. Maybe it’s _hurt_. But _not_ because of what _you_ did or because of what _I_ did but because of what _was done_ to us! We’re the _victims_ in all of this. You’re a victim, Fitz! You were put into the Framework against your will. You had your life altered against your will. You remember being in a relationship that you— _this_ you, the _real_ you never consented to. You are the _victim_ , Fitz, and yet you act like _you_ deserve punishment? No! You don’t! And _I_ don’t! We don’t. And I’m _done_ with that kind of thinking! Our future _isn’t_ dead, Fitz, _not_ if we do something about it! Not if we _talk_ and _mend_ it and mend _ourselves_ and our _relationship_. I want to help you heal! And if you can’t bear the thought of letting someone touch you, or kiss you right now because of the memory of what AIDA did to you, then that’s okay. Of _course_ that’s okay, but _please_ , let me in. Let me in and _talk_ to me and let me help you! And if you feel like you can’t trust yourself right now, then try to trust _me_! You _know_ you can trust me! Trust my trust in _you_! Let’s do this _together_. It’s so much easier to do it together. I _miss_ you! I miss you and you’ve _just_ admitted that you miss me too and our future is still ahead of us! It’s _there_ and it is up to _us_ to fix it. And I _won’t_ give up! I will _fight_ for it, Fitz. Because I _love_ you. And I _know_ you love me.”

It’s getting harder to fight back the tears, but she forces her voice to keep going. It may sound shaky, may try to waver, but Jemma’s determined to finish what she has to say, what she’d bottled up for months. “I’ll fight for our love until my last breath, Fitz, because I _won’t_ give up on the future we could have, the future I _dream_ of. It’s _alive_! And I’m ready to tell you that _every_ day, because _maybe_ if I’m stubborn enough, you’ll listen one day. You’ll listen to _me_ and you’ll listen to your _heart_ and you’ll allow yourself to be _happy._ And _me_ to be happy. And _us_ to be happy and to build our future together, from _ruins_ if we have to, but _together_! I _can’t_ give up, Fitz. I _can’t_ and I _won’t_. I _promised_ you I won’t let _anyone_ rip us apart anymore. And I meant that! I _still_ mean that! We’re _not_ cursed! I _refuse_ to be a slave to some kind of ridiculous idea of fate! I have a _choice_. _You_ have a choice! And the bloody cosmos won’t keep us apart either! In fact, for _once_ it’s doing the opposite, Fitz! Because we’re _stuck_ here together on this _rubbish_ piece of space junk, and in a way I’ve been so _glad_ we are, because at least that means you can’t run; at least that has given me a chance to _see_ you and once in awhile speak five words to you and get my _hopes_ up when I see the _slightest_ hint of a smile on your face. For _once_ the cosmos is our _ally_ rather than our enemy and… and… I _won’t_ give up! I won’t. I—”

She gasps when he cups her cheeks, when his lips press firmly against hers. One of her hands intuitively reaches up to touch his face. But as soon as his lips part from hers, she begins to sob against his mouth in relief, sadness, confusion, all rolled into one.

“You can stop yelling,” he whispers breathlessly, his thumbs trying in vain to wipe away her tears, their foreheads gently leaning against each other. “I heard you. I heard you.”

She opens her eyes, pressing her hand flat against his chest, noticing the watery trails snaking down his cheeks. “Let me in, Fitz. Please, let me in.”

He nods, his hand curling around the back of her head, bringing her ear against his chest. His heartbeat is fast and strong, a mix of fear and determination. Jemma closes her eyes, listening to the steady drumming. She’s not sure how long they stand there, clinging to each other as if the other were a lifeline, crying into each other’s shoulders.

“Let me in,” she whispers over and over, while he replies, “Help me!”

It could have been minutes or hours when they finally loosen their grips on each other, when Fitz looks down at her with teary eyes. “Where do I start, Jemma?”

She smiles, cupping his face. “Repeat after me.”

He nods, swallowing hard, nervousness written in every concerned wrinkle on his face.

“I forgive myself,” Jemma states firmly.

Fitz exhales a shaky breath, trying to suppress more tears.

Jemma lets her thumbs glide gently across the soft skin below his eyes, smiling encouragingly. “Come on, Fitz. Let’s say it together. I—”

“I.” The word is stuttered, when he speaks, as if the single letter were the most difficult thing to pronounce.

“I forgive.”

“I forgive—”

“Myself,” they finish in unison.

A pained smile flashes across his face, followed by a weak chuckle.

“I forgive myself,” he says once again, a bit louder, a bit more confident.

“There you go,” Jemma tells him, smiling widely. “That’s a start. And we’ll repeat that, every day, until you believe it. And that’s gonna be our first step toward our future.”

He sighs, wrapping his arms around her and hesitantly pulling her closer. “You really see all that? A wedding? Kids? Growing old together?”

She nods. “I do, Fitz. I do.”

He’s shaken by sobs and she pulls his head into the nook of her shoulder. “What now, Fitz? What now? Tell me.”

He sniffles, trying to catch his breath. “I… I haven’t dared to allow myself to dream of you saying those words.”

She pushes his head off her shoulder so she can frame it with her hands, her thumbs brushing away a few stray tears. “Dare, Fitz. Dare to dream of it. Dare to imagine it. ‘Cause it’ll happen. It’ll happen if we let it!”

**Author's Note:**

> I still haven't made up my mind about whether I expect the whole team to be on the space station with Coulson or not or what this space station/prison exactly is or whether Fitzsimmons will start the season together or not or together to what extent, but this was one idea I had :)


End file.
